


Catch Me If You Can

by GreenGoth



Series: The Monrosalee Chronicles [5]
Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-29
Updated: 2018-03-29
Packaged: 2019-04-14 07:54:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14131569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreenGoth/pseuds/GreenGoth
Summary: Rosalee asks Monroe for an erotic run in the forest like he used to do with Angelina (without the blood!) but their adventure has unexpected results.





	Catch Me If You Can

**Author's Note:**

> This story takes place not long after Monroe & Rosalee's first wedding anniversary, and explores their Wesen sexuality when they indulge in the "call of the wild". Mature readers only; it's completely consensual and meant to be humorous, startling and erotic but certain elements of the chase could be disturbing to some.
> 
> As always, Grimm and its characters do not belong to me but to their legal owners. I just love to imagine what might have gone on in their lives "off camera" while staying within the storylines of the official Grimm canon. And I just LOVE Monrosalee!

CATCH ME IF YOU CAN

A pleasant fire crackled in the green tiled fireplace, casting its warm glow into the shadowy living room. The May night was misty and damp, water dripping from the eaves of the snug bungalow. Dinner had been cooked, enjoyed and cleaned up after. The cello concerto finished playing and the turntable turned itself off. All was peaceful and in order.

The steady ticking of dozens of clocks and the occasional hiss and pop of logs burning in the fireplace were the only sounds as Rosalee and Monroe sat reading on opposite ends of the comfy yellow couch, the firelight casting a deep ruby glow through the last of dinner’s cabernet in their wine glasses. Curled up against the floral cushion, her slippered feet tucked under her, Rosalee reached for her glass, sipped from it and regarded her husband over its rim.

He was intent on the thick tome “The Invention of Nature – Alexander von Humboldt’s New World”, a dense biography of the late 18th century naturalist, explorer and founder of the modern concept of ecology. German, of course, Rosalee mused, appealing to Monroe’s pride in and fascination with his German heritage. She had given him the book for their anniversary – _among other things_ , she thought with a sly smile at the wicked memories, and he’d been delighted, having never heard of this obscure scientific adventurer whose writings had inspired Darwin, Thoreau, Goethe, Wordsworth and John Muir, among others.

He’d managed to find his reading glasses, she noticed with a fond smile. He looked professorial, relaxed and serene, long legs crossed, the book resting in his lap. That stray lock of hair she so adored curled down on the right side of his forehead and the firelight glinted on the sprinkling of silver hairs in his dark beard.

She marked her place in the Charlaine Harris novel she was reading and closed it in her lap, took another sip of wine and set her glass down on a small uncluttered spot on the coffee table, her eyes still on her beloved.

But after awhile the ticking silence no longer felt quite so peaceful to her, instead a reminder of precious time slipping away. Much as she wanted to, she could no longer suppress the question that had been troubling her. She’d tried to put it out of mind but it kept coming back to haunt her thoughts, and she worried that perhaps someday it might even threaten their happiness.

She fixed her gaze on Monroe until he felt her attention and looked up from his book, meeting her intent brown eyes.

“What?”

“Nothing. Just watching you.”

There was something in her slight smile and the intensity of her gaze that told him it wasn’t ‘nothing’. He knew her moods and quirks well enough now to just tilt his head and raise his eyebrows, waiting for her to elaborate.

“Peaceful evenings like this,” she sighed, and smiled. “They’re nice. But sometimes, do you ever feel like we’ve maybe gotten too – domestic?”

“You mean, peaceful evenings when we don’t get a call or visit from Nick?”

“True, there’s that.” Her smile broadened and she placed her book on the coffee table, settling back closer to him on the couch. But then her pensive mood returned and her smile faded.

With visible effort, she began, “Sometimes I worry that we don’t…that I’m not….” She stopped, her voice catching.

Monroe closed his book and took off his reading glasses, giving her his full attention. “That you’re not what? You’re everything to me, honey, you know that…I hope?”

She shifted uneasily on the couch, drawing her knees up to her chin and wrapping her arms around her legs. “Okay. I’m just going to say it, even though it scares me a little. I can’t help wondering if sometimes you miss…the freedom to really let go and be yourself, your whole self. If maybe you’ve walled off that part of you because I can’t keep up. If sometimes you feel restricted; maybe not now, not yet, but someday, you’ll have regrets…”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, stop right there. What brought all this on?”

“I don’t know. We’ve just gotten so settled in our routines – running our businesses, helping our friends, keeping up with the house and just quietly hanging out together….”

“I love quietly hanging out together, we don’t get to do this nearly often enough. It’s a gift I never thought I’d have, back in my confirmed old _wieder_ bachelor days.” He peered at her curiously. “Are you maybe, like, getting a little bored? Is that it?”

“No! I love our life, especially when we have some breathing space like this between Grimm-related crises. It feels like we’re almost normal people. Except that we’re not.”

“Okaaay...where are you going with this? Am I not paying you enough of the, ah, right kind of attention?” He thought that was unlikely; there was rarely an evening that they didn’t indulge their hunger for each other once they were upstairs for the night…if they made it that far. They had to be exhausted or consumed with stress over some looming Wesen or Grimm problem to forgo the comforts and pleasures of their bedtime together.

“No! I mean, it’s not that; you pay me plenty of attention. Sometimes I just worry that I can’t pay _you_ the right kind of attention.” At his look of bewilderment, she confessed, “I’m only Fuchsbau; I can’t give you everything that Angelina – and others – gave you. I can’t run with you like she did, they did. I can only wonder what it was like, and if sometimes, you wish….”

“Ohhhh. No! Please don’t ever worry about that. And no more of this ‘only Fuchsbau’ business, are you kidding me? I am _so_ not nostalgic about the bad old days, believe me. That was a long time ago, and still not long enough. The last time I indulged in a run, remember, I lapsed and my friend Hap got killed right here in my own house! Kind of puts a permanent damper on any desires in that direction, I can tell you.”

“That was with Angelina….”

“Yeah, when we were supposed to be protecting her own brother! And she couldn’t have tempted me like that if I hadn’t been so alone and solitary – okay, celibate, for such a long time.”

“You never told me much about anyone else, except that there were others. At our stage of life, of course there were. And I know, I know,” she held up a hand to fend off his protest, “from the first with us, I was the one saying let’s not talk about past relationships. Ian was too painful, and I wasn’t proud of….”

“Shhhh, we’re not going there.”

“Right. Sorry. It’s just, your life is so controlled and orderly, you’re so devoted to your regimen, and I know for very good reasons. And it’s hard to even keep that on an even keel with all the, let’s say, unexpected stressful situations Nick’s drawn you into over the past several years.”

“Yeah, nothing like a night of limb-tearing and throat-ripping to make me go full vegan and up my heaviest meds for a month or so, till I get the impulses back under control. But that’s not what you’re talking about, is it?”

“I don’t mean the whole ‘wild in the Cascades, not going indoors for a month’ kind of thing, but do you ever wish you could go way out in nature again, let your Other self run free and, you know, play in the woods instead of always being so civilized, indoors, when we…” Rosalee lowered her eyes and ran her hand over his thigh, leaving no doubt what kind of play she meant.

“A lot of what we do indoors isn’t exactly what most people would consider civilized,” Monroe reminded her softly, covering her hand and giving her his wolfish smile when she looked up. “And don’t worry about competing with my past relationships. Angelina was the only one wild enough to run like that, and you got a small taste of what she was like. No, thanks, so done with that.”

“I admit, I’ve been kind of fantasizing about it a little, trying to imagine what it’s really like, playing in the woods the way you and…whoever, in the past, played in the woods.”

“You mean, like – oh. Wow. Seriously? You really want to know?” When she nodded, he shifted uncomfortably, clasped and unclasped his hands and looked toward the dancing flames across the room. “Well, it’s not exactly comfortable, like, you know, bare skin in 40 degree drizzle, no blankets, no shoes, no shelter…”

“I didn’t mean quite _that_ old school,” Rosalee said with a small chuckle. Then, squeezing his thigh and making herself say the scary thing before she lost her nerve, “I meant going out for a run, just us, and not to hunt anything except, well – each other.”

“Ohhh. You’re talking about _us_? Doing the naughty in the great outdoors? Better make sure there’re no Boy Scout troops or Oregon State botany students roaming around out there, they could be scarred for life!” He looked back at her, eyes wide with feigned shock.

Rosalee let go of her legs and rocked back on the couch giggling in relief, lightly smacking his shoulder. “Wicked and scandalous!” Then, a seductive tone in her voice, “No, but really, I’m thinking just you and me, somewhere remote and secluded enough where we could try a little ‘call of the wild’.”

“You’re talking the chase then, as in ‘chase me till I catch you’?”

She could tell by the return of his wolfish smile and the way he looked at her sideways, head cocked a bit, eyes glittering, that this time he got that she was serious.

“Yeah, like that.” Feeling more confident now, she crawled across the couch on all fours toward him, her breasts swaying under her loose bohemian blouse.

“The kind of chase that ends up with taking each other down, rolling around in the forest duff and ferns – which by the way isn’t as soft as you might think – and doing the wild thing in, well, the wild?”

“Exactly what I had in mind.” She was face to face with him now, still on hands and knees, and lowered her lashes to give him bedroom eyes.

“You’d really want to do that?”

“I kind of think…I’d like to try. See if I can be that, for you.” She blushed a little, a rarity for ever-practical, no-nonsense apothecary Rosalee, and knelt on the couch beside him. “I know I’m not Blutbad, not even close. And we’re so urban and indoorsy here; I sometimes worry that maybe you might miss it, even a little bit, now and then?”

He averted his eyes. “I can tell you what I don’t miss.”

“I know. The out-of-control, God what did I do last night – ”

“And, God, what did I _kill_ last night? Especially that part.”

“I’m not talking about that part. Not full-on giving in to every instinct and going wild, running _woged_ so long and so often you’d be risking….”

“Lapsing back into the Umkippen?” He looked at her darkly, voice deadly serious. “Losing days and nights in blackouts and wondering where the hell we were and what we’d done when I came to my senses, till I finally had to leave Angelina out there and go into rehab before it was too late? No way.”

He heaved a deep sigh, rubbing his palms together and gazing back at the fireplace while Rosalee waited, regretting she’d ever broached the painful subject. She’d only thought of running with him for the erotic thrill of it, not how intensely tied it was to that very dark time in his life, and to the immense guilt he would always feel about Hap’s death.

After a long and pensive silence he said softly, eyes still focused on the fire, “I’d like to think that after all this time, working the program, sticking to the regimen, staying clear of the wrong situations – as much as I can, anyway, given our odd circle of friends – I’d be okay giving in to temptation like that, once in a blue moon, maybe. Where I lost it…” He made himself turn and meet her eyes. “I’ll tell you frankly, it was the hunting, the bloodlust, all tied up with the sex. When she tore into that damned rabbit and shoved its squirming bloody body in my face…” He looked down at the floor, shaking his head in regret and shame.

“No hunting,” Rosalee said firmly. “No blood. But for us, maybe just once, just so I can know how it feels, so I can share it with you...” She took his face in her hands and made him look at her. “The whole ‘wild, unbridled lust in the forest’ thing.”

He stared into her eyes a moment before he was able to speak, mouth falling open a bit, then managed, half-joking, “Ahhh…gee, why don’t you just come out and tell me what you want? It doesn’t work to make me guess. _Damn_ , woman – is that really what you want?”

“I’d like to try. Maybe once we get out in the woods we’ll just feel silly and end up laughing too hard to actually _go_ there….”

“I don’t think so,” he said, a warning edge to his voice. “The whole ‘chase your mate’ thing is pretty intense for Blutbaden.”

“As long as you’d remember it’s a lust chase and not a hunt. I wouldn’t stand a ghost of a chance if it went….”

“Never.” His voice was definite, eyes solemn. “Never with you. I would never lose it and hunt you, love. Not possible, never going to happen. No way.”

“Okay, then.”

“Really. You want to go way out into the forest, in the drizzle and the fog and the wet leaves and the moss, and have me chase you down and roll you and make wild, furry love to you on the forest floor.”

“Yes.”

“You’re sure.”

“Yes!”

“Okay. Works for me.”

 

_Too bad this hadn’t come up during the warmer, drier summer months_ , Monroe thought as he checked the National Weather Service forecast again. May was supposed to be the end of the rainy season (“Okay, the rain _ier_ season,” he told himself) in their temperate rainforest region, and the daytime temperatures were only in the sixties at best.

On the other hand, there were lots more hikers and backpackers roaming the forests during the summer months, even on weekdays.

They’d picked a Wednesday (“hump day,” Rosalee had joked, a naughty twinkle in her eyes), as far from the weekend as they could to minimize the likelihood of running into anyone else, and planned to drive out a couple of hours from Portland into a National Forest wilderness area not frequented by the types who wanted established trails, and not much frequented by humans in general.

 

The forecast looked promising, partly cloudy with highs in the mid-60s, lows in the chilly 40s, but they had no intention of being out there after dark. So if they kept moving – and that was certainly the plan – it shouldn’t be too uncomfortable. He hoped. This was still Portland, the Pacific Northwest.

Since he knew the forest backcountry better than she did, having hunted there with friends before his committed _wieder_ days, he’d spent days planning this “spontaneous” erotic run in the woods, plotting as best he could to minimize any hazards, human or otherwise, that could turn this outing into anything from an embarrassment to a disaster, stocking up emergency supplies to take along and researching areas of the forest that should be conducive to a run that would be exhilarating but with terrain that wasn’t too physically challenging or risky.

Part of him was focused on the practical, methodical preparations, but he had to admit another part was starting to feel a growing excitement about Rosalee’s startling proposition.

They hadn’t talked about it much beyond the necessary details but the anticipation was there in the way they looked at each other and when they touched, casually or otherwise. Even on the phone, there were subtle tones and inflections in their voices no matter how mundane the subject of the call.

The sexual tension was building, despite their usual nighttime indulgences. He had the sense that she was doing some plotting and planning of her own, and had to wonder what she might have in store for him that he wouldn’t be expecting.

He’d never chased a Fuchsbau before, let alone with lustful intentions. And she’d been flirting with him shamelessly, dropping double entendres into nearly every private conversation.

It made it damned hard to concentrate on watch repairs.

 

Tuesday evening Rosalee closed the shop and posted a “Closed till Thursday” hand-lettered note under the usual flip sign on the door glass. She’d already recorded an emergency referral contact on the shop’s answering machine and her cell phone voice mail. As she locked up she felt a flutter of anxious anticipation.

“We are really doing this. Tomorrow!” she told herself.

Everything was ready for a quick launch in the morning when they climbed the stairs after dinner, intentionally not touching or looking at each other as they changed into their sleep clothes. Rosalee settled under the covers on her side of the bed and looked up at Monroe as he lifted the sheet and blankets on his side to join her.

“I’m not so sure I want to do this,” he said doubtfully, looking down into her eyes as he settled in beside her, propped up on his pillows.

“The run?” She looked startled and her brows knit in disappointment. _After all this preparation and anticipation?_

“No, this. Sleeping with you but not touching you. I know, we agreed it’d build up the, ah, you know, energy for tomorrow even more, but….”

“Kind of like the night before the wedding, together but not actually making love, saving it for the wedding night.”

“Not to mention the house was bursting at the seams with our parents and DeEtta staying here.” He smiled as Rosalee grimaced and rolled her eyes. “All right, I guess I’m okay with ‘saving ourselves’; I just don’t want to try to sleep without even touching you.”

“I don’t think we need to go that far with this self-denial, excitement-building thing,” she said, her eyes shining and her smile warm. “Maybe we can just spoon together?”

“Works for me.” He pushed down under the covers until he was pressed full length along her body and drew her over against him, her back to his front, arms enfolding her and one hand cupping her breast. At first she snuggled into his embrace, hugging his arms and clasping one hand, their fingers entwined as he nuzzled the nape of her neck and kissed that sensitive spot.

But after a moment she started to laugh softly. “This isn’t going to work!”

“What?” He said it with mock innocence but couldn’t help chuckling.

“You know what! How am I supposed to fall into a chaste sleep with you wrapped around me pressing that wonderful hard cock against my back? You know what’s going to happen next!”

He tightened his embrace and wrapped his legs around hers, rubbing against her suggestively.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about. How am I supposed to fall asleep with you prattling on and on? Isn’t that nightshirt uncomfortable bunched up like that? Let me smooth it out for you.” He started tugging at the hem of her sleep shirt, pulling it up toward her waist while he kissed her nape again and ran a warm hand over her thigh.

A throaty laugh escaped her as she caught his hand and held it still against her thigh. “You are just awful!”

“That’s not what you said last night. Or the night before, and the one before that, and….”

“And that’s why we were going to abstain, just for tonight. Just till tomorrow.”

“Whose idea was this again? I’m sure it wasn’t mine.”

“Actually we both thought of it, remembering the night before the wedding.”

“It seemed like a better idea a week ago,” he sighed, gently stroking her breast with the hand she hadn’t captured, finding her nipple already erect before he circled it with warm fingertips. Her breath caught at his touch and he smiled into her silky hair.

“Busted,” he teased, lips moving against her ear.

“I’m not saying I don’t want to; I do. But that’s kind of the point….” She broke off, laughing again, as she felt his other “point” pressing harder against the small of her back. “Okay – are we going to give up and go for it, or try to stay with Plan A?”

“Depends. I’m already so hot for you, I feel like an unexploded bomb. Just think how much worse it’ll be for you if I have to wait and expend all this after I catch you tomorrow. Or, you could just arch your back a little and I’ll pull our impeding garments out of the way….” He started rearranging their bodies and tugging her nightshirt up higher so he could enter her from behind while still in their spooning position.

She gave a delighted little shriek before stopping his hands again, laughing. “No fair! I’ll take my chances with Plan A. Save all that erotic energy for the chase tomorrow; I have some plans for you, too, my big bad wolf! Now, roll over, tall guy. I’ll spoon you, so we can both get some sleep!”

“I am really not sure about that,” he grumbled good-naturedly, but acquiesced to her plan. “How’m I supposed sleep in the condition you’ve left me in?”

She wrapped herself around him, pressed against his back, and kissed his neck. “I am totally innocent. You did it to yourself; you can have your revenge tomorrow.”

“Mmmpf. Did not.” He pulled her hand down to rest on his pajama pants over his erection. “The least you could do….”

“Nope.” She gave him a wicked squeeze and withdrew her hand, resting her palm on his chest instead. “Just remember, I’m suffering, too.”

“You are in sooo much trouble.”

“Bring it on – tomorrow.” She hugged him and lightly nipped his ear.

“Oh, baby….”

 

Monroe heard Rosalee’s light steps on the stairway as she made her way down to the kitchen. “Come and get it while it’s hot!” he called to her, pouring two mugs of strong coffee from the French press just as she appeared in the doorway. He’d already filled two large well-insulated Thermoses to take with them.

“Wow – did you invite some lumberjacks to join us for breakfast?” Rosalee asked, looking over the impressive spread Monroe had prepared for them while she was taking her turn in the shower.

“I have a hearty appetite, and you should, too – you’re going to need sustenance if you’re going to stay ahead of me for long.”

“Okay, so some serious carb loading going on here.” She filled her plate with a sliced croissant stuffed with fluffy scrambled eggs and oozing melted herbed cheese, a banana nut muffin warm from the oven, fresh fruit and a wedge of his famous spinach and mushroom quiche.

“And goji berry-yogurt-protein powder smoothies for, ah, stamina.” He raised and lowered his eyebrows at her suggestively as he poured two glasses from the blender before filling his own plate.

“I’ll be too full to waddle, let alone run!”

“Trust me, it’s chilly out there. We’ll need calories just to keep warm on the hike in from the road. And the leftovers are going in the picnic basket to devour after we get back to the car; I promise you’ll be more than a little peckish.”

He’d barely settled across the table from her when she took a slice of mango and slowly sucked it into her mouth through her luscious, pursed lips, staring at him intently.

Taking up the game, he peeled the paper cup off a muffin and ate the insides out from the bottom up with a lot of all too familiar lip and tongue action, never breaking eye contact.

Rosalee squirmed and giggled, purposely taking a huge swig of her smoothie and licking the excess off her lips with just the tip of her tongue. She took the wedge of quiche and inserted it slowly, deeply into her mouth before biting down.

Monroe couldn’t hold back a laugh. “What is this, the erotic dinner scene from ‘Tom Jones’?”

“Cultural literacy is so important, another thing I love about you.”

“No such thing as esoteric knowledge or wasted education. You just never know when it’ll come in useful.”

He picked up his croissant and began pointedly licking out the melted cheese until they both burst out laughing and had to stop the game for fear of choking.

 

The morning was bright and promising as they hit the road in Rosalee’s little brown Fiat 500 and left Portland and its surrounding smaller towns behind them, gaining elevation as they drove deeper into the mountains. Traffic had thinned to nearly nothing this far out; Rosalee followed their trek on a Forest Service map as Monroe turned onto barely paved, then graveled forest roads with minimal signage, at best.

The streaks of sky they could see above the towering Douglas fir and cedar forest crowding the roads had promising clear patches amid some wispy clouds. Bathed in the rare sunlight, the sky’s blue and the varied forest greens seemed too vivid to be quite real to Rosalee, so accustomed to the routinely gray skies and fog and busy streets of their beloved city. It only added to her sense of unreality about acting on her fantasy out here.

Thickets of invasive Himalayan blackberries snarled the forest edge like living barbed wire, interspersed with western hemlock and spreading mounds of thimbleberry and salmonberry, their flowers and fruit yet to come in summer.

“I hope this turns out to be a little less traumatic than our first picnic,” Monroe said. “I wanted to make sure we were too far out to run into anybody.”

“Oh, the picnic part was great! Could’ve done without the ‘run for our lives’ part afterward. But I’ll never forget how fast you drove us out of there in the trusty Bug – in reverse!”

“Could’ve done without the whole _fluvus pestilentia_ complication altogether; I almost lost you just when we were finding each other. Though I sure don’t mind you climbing all over me like that when we’re in private.”

“It was very unprofessional behavior in a place of business,” she said ruefully, “and fortunately I don’t remember much of any of it.” She peered out at the narrowing gravel road as the forest closed in around them, deep in shadow even in mid morning. “Where exactly are you taking us?”

“Trust me. I used to hunt this area with Sam and Ned back in the day; we’d set up camp and make a weekend of it, never ran into another soul.”

“I don’t know much about your early years in Portland.”

“Before the bad times – not much to tell. After all the years of college back east, by the time I finished grad school at Brown, Halfmoon Lake was way too provincial for me but I’d had more than enough of East Coast city life. Felt the need for something different but with easy access to some serious wild nature. Even back then, Portland had the reputation of its own special vibe, and what I do is portable enough so I thought, what the hell, give it a try.”

“All those years of college and you went back to horology.”

“I needed a break from academia, needed to clear my head and figure out what on earth I wanted to do with my life. I studied a lot of things I loved without much thought about how to make a living at any of it. The whole liberal arts dilemma, you know?”

“Not really. I was a pre-med bio major and went into pharmacology.”

“Oh. Right. The science behind the apothecary thing. Have I told you how scary smart you are sometimes, by the way?”

“It didn’t feel like it. Freddy was so far ahead of me, I felt like something of a fraud even pretending I could ever know as much as he and Mom and Dad, or even enough to be really useful to them in the business. But I didn’t know what else to do, nothing interested me enough to change direction.” She looked out her window at the green blur as they drove through the darkening forest. “I’ve always liked languages and travel, but after Dad’s entanglements with the Council and the Resistance – and after Ian – I didn’t want to get into any kind of journalism or diplomatic field, and I’ve certainly never been the corporate type.”

“God, no! I can’t imagine you trapped in a glass tower ‘cube farm’ having to do the whole power suit, Dilbert-esque, climb up the bureaucratic hierarchy thing.”

“I’d jump off the glass tower in about five minutes, no question! And probably push somebody else off ahead of me.”

Monroe chuckled, keeping his eyes on the rough road, driving around rain-ponded ruts and potholes. “That’s how I felt about teaching after watching Mom wrangle generations of high schoolers through her math and science classes. She had a reputation for being formidable and scary, even though most of the kids and her colleagues had no idea the real reason why.”

“A Blutbad math teacher – now, that’s the very definition of ‘scary’ to a lot of math-phobes out there!”

Monroe gave an appreciative laugh. “So, no, didn’t want to teach, even at the college level; got a big enough taste of that assisting professors as a grad student. And I needed to get away from the hometown milieu, some family tensions going on, some personal history to put behind me for a while. No burning desire to just join the clock business with Dad and my aunt and uncle as the very junior partner, and go back to hanging out with the family pack and my old high school friends, the few who didn’t have to leave to find work. Not a whole lot going on in rural New Hampshire job-wise. So, yeah, the Northwest seemed just about far enough, and I love the climate here. Kind of a Goldilocks deal, you know? Not too big, not too small, not too cold, not too hot. And Portland is, well – Portland.”

Rosalee shrugged. “I’m just used to it since I grew up around here; didn’t realize how special it is until I tried to live somewhere else.”

“Yeah, we both kind of burned some major bridges with our bad times.”

“More like Sherman’s march through Georgia in my case,” she said grimly. “I thought I could never come back here to live. Just visiting Freddy for Thanksgiving felt like sneaking behind enemy lines.”

“Ouch.” He reached over and rubbed her thigh, resting his hand there. “But lucky for us, Portland’s a place where you can reinvent yourself, some people on a regular basis. And there’re a lot of good folks in _our_ community to throw you a lifeline and not let go. So, here we both are today – thank God.” He peered past her over to the right and pulled the car off the road along a bumpy dirt track, parking it behind a thicket of Western Hemlock beneath the towering firs.

“And, here we are.”

Rosalee looked out into the wild jumble of branches bearded with hanging moss, tangled canes of dormant Oregon grape, tall clumps of ferns spreading their wide fronds over the forest floor. “We can run through this?”

He got out and came around to open her door. “Need to walk back in a ways. It opens up enough and the wild critters have their own trails.” He gave her a feral smile as she stepped out into the fragrant forest. “All kinds of wild critters.”

She felt an apprehensive thrill tighten her middle as she slipped around him, their bodies brushing below the waist as he intentionally crowded her just enough between the door and the car. They took their daypacks out of the back seat and locked the car, hoisting the packs on their shoulders.

Rosalee inhaled deeply, closing her eyes and letting her Fuchsbau senses expand. The forest was seething with all kinds of life around them, large and small, plant and animal, predator and prey. That last thought made her shiver.

Monroe noticed and put his arm around her waist. “You’re still sure you want to do this.”

“Yes! It all just smells so alive…I forget how much I kind of shield myself against a lot of the smells and sounds in the city.” She scented the air again as if tasting a new wine, tilting her head back and leaning into his arm. “Wow.”

“Right? I hoped you’d like this place. Okay, then, we need to get moving; we’re burning daylight. And the walk will warm us up a bit – for later.”

They hiked back in a couple of miles from the road to an area of forest that looked primeval and undisturbed. Talking and laughing, their voices echoed strangely in the peaceful woodland as they walked, the sexual tension building as they got closer to their planned encounter. Rosalee began to wonder just how far from any civilization he was taking her; she’d never been this deep into trackless wilderness before.

“Okay, here’s the spot. Good, the old snag is still standing!” He walked over to a venerable old tree, all but dead, its trunk hollowed out and blackened by fire ages ago; the space inside was large enough for both of them to stand in. “We can stash our stuff here, mostly out of the weather if it changes on us, though so far,” he leaned back, looking up into the far reaches of the tree canopy for a glimpse of blue sky, “we’re good.”

He shrugged off his pack and turned to help Rosalee out of hers, and she had the eerie sensation that he was undressing her. She shivered again in anticipation.

“Cold?” If anything they were both a bit too warm from their hike through the woods, wearing all their layers of jacket, sweater, flannels and tee shirts. “It’s only about sixty or so, not too bad.” He turned her to look up at him, hands holding her shoulders. “Or nervous a little, maybe?”

“Kind of like a Thoroughbred at the starting gate, I think.” She smiled, feeling her lips tremble a little. “I’m thinking you have an unfair advantage. I didn’t realize you knew this place so well from your hunting days.”

“Not really. I haven’t been out here for, let’s see, eight, ten years, maybe? Things change. And I have no idea which directions you’re going to run.” His deep brown eyes seemed darker, the pupils wider, and his smile, though not showing teeth, was filled with wicked promise.

Rosalee felt that smile all the way down to her core, felt her sex clench and warm with anticipation. She drew another deep breath, scenting him, scenting his arousal, too, as he released her shoulders and stepped back.

Yes. They were really doing this.

They started shedding outer garments, rolling them up and stashing them in waterproof bags in the hollow tree. Practical Monroe strongly recommended that they keep on one layer of clothes and their boots. “Don’t need to totally go old school to have a good time, and we city folk are not conditioned to run over rough ground barefoot, claws notwithstanding.”

Rosalee’s heart started racing as she stripped down to her jeans and old russet long-sleeved tee, one she wouldn’t mind tossing if it didn’t survive their run. She caught her hair back in a clip to keep it out of her eyes and watched Monroe pull his sweater vest over his head and roll it up in his heavy flannel shirt, a gray Henley partially unbuttoned at his neck the only thing covering him from the waist up. He stared into her eyes as he removed his belt and rolled it up, stashing it with the rest of his clothes. Too much of an impediment to quick action, apparently. She stared back at him defiantly, putting as much heat into it as she felt surging through her Wesen self in response.

“Last chance – you’re sure you want to go through with this?”

“Ready when you are, but you’re going to have to give me some lead time to make this interesting. You’re a lot faster than I am.” Her chest was rising and falling fast, instinctively building up the oxygen in her blood for the impending pursuit.

Monroe nodded, satisfied that she was really game for this. He let his gaze fall to her heaving bosom, then travel back up to her face. Her lips were slightly parted, breath coming quickly. She was poised to run, her weight on the balls of her feet.

He consulted the waterproof wristwatch he’d selected for their outing. “Okay, I propose to give you a ten minute head start, just to give you a sporting chance. Think that’s enough?”

“I can run a long way in ten minutes, and confuse the hell out of the scent trail, too.” Her smile was wide, her eyes bright with the challenge – and anticipation of the finish.

“Don’t worry.” His eyes flashed red. “I’ll find you.” There was a delicious threat in his voice, low and rumbling.

Saucy, she _woged_ briefly, releasing a waft of musky Fuchsbau scent, then pressed herself to him for a hungry kiss before whirling to dash off into the forest. The thick duff of centuries muffled her footsteps and the interweaving branches of firs and cedars closed behind her.

His Blutbad instincts achingly aroused, it took all his control not to immediately charge after her.

Monroe thought the allotted ten minutes ticked by exceedingly slowly, glancing at his watch several times before her head start was up. He had no concern that she’d get lost in the trailless forest, or any doubt that he’d easily track and catch her; he just urgently wanted to get on with it.

He looked uneasily skyward while he waited. The blue patches that had hovered over them on the drive here were being obscured by ragged fingers of gray, the ceiling still high but the possibility of rain more threatening than the forecast had predicted. He shook his head, accustomed to the Pacific Northwest and its infamous “liquid sunshine”.

Time was up.

He started after his mate, her familiar and particular Fuchsbau scent rich and exciting, calling to him amid the myriad plant and animal aromas of the old growth forest.

Wildermanner had been through here recently, a mated pair of them, their primate scent tinged with pheromones and conifer and damp earth. He thought of Larry with a pang of loss, but let the sad thought go as he concentrated on Rosalee’s scent weaving through the trees, back-tracking along a stream bed and then over the stream along a thin fallen log. She was messing with him, trying to throw him off her trail; he would need to concentrate a bit.

Belatedly he remembered Rosalee telling him about the favorite sport of the Irish cousins she’d stayed with as a girl, confusing the local hunt’s foxhounds with their own Wesen vulpine scents crossing the trail of the natural fox that the hunt was after and sending them off in all the wrong directions, which the cousins delighted in watching from their perches high in the rocks and trees. The best fun of all were the times the pack of hounds swarmed the base of their tree, baying determinedly at the cluster of laughing children sitting in its branches. Little did the hunters realize that the hounds knew exactly which prey they were baying after.

 

Rosalee grinned like that wild young girl as she ran, intermittently _woged_ and crafting false trails through the cool rainforest to make this a worthy chase for her lover. She made wide loops and doubled back on herself, crossing and re-crossing her own trails, wading downstream, leaping up on embankments for short jaunts and then retracing her steps and walking back through the water, purposely releasing scent in some places and masking it in others, indulging for the first time in too many years the sheer joy of running through the forest at play.

And this was serious play. It had consequences, more serious than misleading a pack of hunting foxhounds – falling into the claws of her very randy, frustrated Blutbad.

She stifled giggles as she swarmed up a huge tree, holding onto thick woody vines that encased it, balancing like the dancer and gymnast she’d been in high school out along a long limb and dropping down on the other side of a dense thicket of hawthorn and huckleberries. The thick duff muffled her landing and she scurried off, obscuring her tracks through drifts of trillium and wild ginger. She glanced quickly at her own watch and realized with a rush that her lead time was up.

He was coming after her. Now.

 

Monroe jogged through the trees following her scent trail easily in his human form, nostrils flaring, taking in a deeper breath from time to time. She was heading downhill, no doubt toward one of the many rocky streams that ran through these woodlands, hoping to hide her tracks in the water and leave him to work out where she’d crossed to pick up her trail again.

Her scent faded at a young grove of incense cedars, their distinctive red-brown bark nearly the color of her shirt. She’d worn that color for camouflage; he’d known that the minute she pulled off her sweater back at the hollow tree. So she’d done her homework about this forest, too. He stopped, _woging_ to enhance his sense of smell. Her foxy musk lingered in the air around him but faded when he moved away in any direction.

He listened intently, pointed ears twitching. The forest was quiet, only the distant rat-a-tat of a woodpecker at work and the raucous squawks of Stellar’s jays in the trees above him breaking the stillness. Could she be hiding in the grove, masking her scent among the aromatic trees? He shook his head with a growl, certain she wouldn’t have gone to ground so soon in their run. Not after her saucy taunting before she took off into the woods.

He circled the grove, searching for any disturbance in the undergrowth, any bent twigs or indentations in the thick mat of rotting conifer needles and fallen leaves. Just when he’d started wondering if she’d brought along a sealed bag of wolfsbane from his backyard patch to cover her scent, it was there again – she’d purposely marked a big leaf maple, pressing her hand into one of the huge palmate leaves that lay scattered against its massive trunk.

The intoxicating blend of her musk and perspiration on that leaf inflamed him. He scanned the ground but the dense fall of wet maple leaves, each one larger than his own hand, covered any sign of her passing. Her scent seemed to divert off in four different directions, with the towering maple at their center.

He unwoged, amused and a bit chagrined that her mischievous Fuchsbau tricks had confused her trail for the moment. So much for his confidence in superior Blutbad tracking abilities. Once again, she was enjoying making him work for this. He settled down to business, scenting each direction to determine which was the most recent, but they all seemed equally fresh.

So she couldn’t have gone too far in any one direction before coming back to cross her own path and head off another way. But which way had she kept on going after this little trick? Downhill toward water was still his best guess.

“Okay, my crafty vixen, you’re going to be _that way_ ….”

He moved off along a faint deer trail through the interwoven ferns and saplings, spying a partial boot print in a damp patch of bare ground. She was headed toward a creek where the deer had gone to drink, then. He smiled to himself, moving faster, catching the faintest whiff of her in the dampest, coolest places beneath the tunnel of overarching branches.

He reached the creek and was not surprised when her trail faded again; the stony creek bed showed no muddy disturbance from someone wading upstream, and the lack of scent or footprints in the moist embankment told him she hadn’t crossed, so she must have gone downstream letting the swift current carry the evidence away from her.

Rosalee watched from her perch in the high crotch of a sturdy white oak as Monroe waded down the creek, following the rough figure eight pattern she’d laid for him. It would wind around and send him back to the center point at the big leaf maple again, by which time she’d be down from her tree and sprinting east toward a larger stream she could hear tumbling over boulders on the down slope beyond the next stand of Doug-firs.

_If he fell for it._

If he didn’t, in a very few minutes she would be toast, buttered and spread. The thought made her giggle and at the same time feel an exciting jolt of primal fear. Seeing him actually on the hunt for her in his Blutbad form from this vantage point thrilled her almost as much as imagining what he meant to do with her when he caught her.

Once he was out of sight she shinnied down the tree and took off, trotting along a rougher path recently broken by a black bear sow and her nearly grown cubs, and something – someone else. She stopped and _woged_ to tease out the muddled scents and examine the overlapping paw prints along the trail. The bears had been followed by a trio of _woged_ adolescent male Jägerbars some time last night, tracking and observing their honored totem animals at a respectful distance. At least one of them was overly fond of Axe body spray.

The harsh chemical cologne made her sneeze violently in her Fuchsbau form, and she quickly covered her muzzle with her furry hands to muffle the sound. She froze in place, silent, listening.

There was no sound or sign of Monroe. But then, there wouldn’t be, until it was too late.

Making her way down a steep slope toward the rushing stream, Rosalee grabbed onto sturdy branches and smaller trees to keep from slipping on the wet fir needles underfoot. It was hard not to leave skidding track marks in the duff here and he would surely catch her scent where she’d held onto the trees.

As she descended, the sound of water splashing and surging over rocks grew louder. She began to wonder if this was more a river than a stream or just a noisy set of rapids, and worried that either might be too dangerous to cross. Large boulders and exposed rock faces rose around her as she moved along and she realized the way was narrowing around her. Whatever waterway this was, it had carved a deep passage through the forest for itself over time.

Looking around, she began to feel a little claustrophobic. It would not be easy to climb back up out of here, where it was possible at all except to retreat the way she’d come. She’d stumbled into an area that offered few options for escape.

_Maybe I’d better backtrack and head off somewhere else_ , she thought. _If I have time_ …. She stopped to listen but could only hear the thundering of water over rocks below.

Her inner Fuchsbau stirred anxiously as she took in her surroundings. _Get out_ , her Other whispered. _Not safe here. Trap!_

Rosalee tended to agree. She turned around and made her way back up, on hands and knees in places where the steep and slippery footing wouldn’t let her walk. Her heart was beating hard and fast from the climbing and the unspoken anxiety that she would come face to face with the determined Blutbad hot on her trail.

Where the slope leveled off, she chose another way that dipped down but not so steeply and away from the deep riverbed. _Maybe he’ll track me down toward the river before he realizes I turned back_ , she thought hopefully but knew she was kidding herself. She’d lost a good chunk of time with that dead end.

Making her way through thick stands of alder and willow, she found a much smaller stream, meandering and shallow. She waded upstream through it but frowned seeing plumes of mud spreading in the flow from where she’d stepped. Depending on how close he was, they might not dissipate before he got here.

And this marshy place would not be conducive to their grand finale.

She stepped up onto a mossy bank and moved away from the creek along a faint track weaving between the riparian trees, its twists and turns obscuring the way ahead through their dense and leafy branches.

_Most likely this is where the local critters come to drink_ , she thought and then shivered, remembering that made it an excellent place for predators to lie in wait.

_Danger_ , her Other warned again, more in feelings than words, and her heart beat faster as her instincts thrummed with alarm. She felt her adrenaline surge preparing her to react quickly to any threat, fight or flight. She held still listening again but there was nothing but trickling water and the high-pitched calls of small birds in the surrounding trees.

Rounding a broad willow with its dense spread of narrow branches, she stopped short at the sight of something lying in her path, its bright colors in stark contrast to the leafy barriers and dark wet soil around her.

At first her mind couldn’t make sense of what she was seeing but her nose soon made it clear. The scent of death and decaying flesh assailed her nostrils and the ragged pile on the ground, partly draped over a fallen branch, came suddenly into sharp focus.

Her Other surged within; she felt its shock and fear, and the quick stinging pain of her involuntary _woge_.

There was fur, red-orange and black, loose tufts of it, and more clinging to the shredded skin that spread across the ground and over the branch. Bits of bone, some shattered and chewed, stuck out of the remains but all of the viscera were gone.

The head was bent back, black nose and white chin pointed skyward and its throat torn out, staring eyes open but one eyeball missing, the other sunken and dried, its ears folded back under its grimacing skull. The distinctive bushy tail, rust red with black hairs intermixed, ended in a tip of bright white.

It was, _had been_ a fox. Its body was ripped open from throat to tail, disemboweled and mostly eaten, its white vertebrae, ribs and pelvis exposed. Insects and maggots diligently worked consuming the rest. Bits of belly skin with white fur were scattered on the ground around the savaged corpse.

Rosalee stood in shock, the image of the murdered fox emblazoned on her mind, no longer conscious that she was standing there morphed in its image.

_Predator. Killer!_ her inner Fuchsbau cried, not in words but in flashing visions of deadly creatures that would do this. _Run – hide! Escape!_

“Oh, shit,” she hissed softly through sharp teeth, still staring down at the body. “You poor thing – I hope it was over fast, whatever did this to you.”

Badly shaken, she stepped carefully over the remains feeling the urgent need to run quickly from this place of death. She couldn’t tell what kind of predator had taken her little natural cousin; there were no paw prints or bits of fur caught on protruding branches along the track. But it had been merciless and thorough.

She began to trot along the animal path as fast as the dense vegetation allowed, reacting to the deep instinctual drive to distance herself from the fox’s fate and its attacker. She felt pressure from behind, driving her forward without being clear what lay ahead in this unknown territory.

In the distance a low strange sound penetrated through the trickling water and birdsong. It rose rapidly to a crescendo, holding a long note. Then the howl began again.

She froze at the sound, paralyzed with ancient fear. Her heart raced, her breath caught as she listened, gut clenching in recognition.

_Wolf_. Worse, _Blutbad_.

Her inner vixen panicked as her eyes swept her surroundings looking for escape or a safe place to go to ground. The slopes on all sides of her were too steep to climb, offered no hand or footholds to pull herself up out of the streambed. She could only go forward through this watershed and hope there was a passage out ahead.

_He’s coming_ , her Other whispered desperately, _He’s after me!_ Her mind filled with the moving image of a massive _woged_ Blutbad, red eyes blazing, deadly fangs bared, on the hunt – relentless, fast and cruel.

Beneath the fear she felt her Other’s churning confusion. _What’s happening to me? Why am I out here all alone? No one to help me, no place to hide…_ The words were fading but the thoughts were clear. She was in deadly danger and the threat was coming, now.

The image of the mangled fox filled her mind.

Another memory intruded, the dead fox hanging, bleeding outside the Spice Shop’s back door – a gruesome warning against her mixed species marriage from the Wesenrein.

_Marriage_ … Her human mind struggled to be heard over the panic. _Monroe. Not a predator – Monroe_.

Looking down she realized her hands were covered in red and white fur, her nails sharp and curved. Hyperventilating, she focused hard and shook off her _woge_ , trying to ignore the anguished cry of her inner creature.

“I am Rosalee Calvert,” she said aloud, trying to regain control. “I’m a grown adult human being.” _Among other things_ , the voice in her mind insisted. “I’m not lost, I am not being hunted. Monroe will find me and I’ll be fine.”

But now their chase felt threatening, sinister. _What if he was wrong and the drive to hunt was too strong for him, running wild like this?_

She remembered those two long howls and trembled to the core of her being.

Then his voice echoed from her memory: _I would never lose it and hunt you, love. Not possible, never going to happen._

And yet…and yet, it happened when he ran with Angelina.

_No. No!_ she told herself. _They killed a rabbit; he wasn’t trying to kill her. That was just sex..._

And blood, and blackout. He’d been completely honest with her about that night and the shock of waking up out in the woods disoriented and bloody, not remembering at first how he got there and what they’d done.

“Oh, my god, Monroe,” she said, voice shaky and sounding strange in her solitary forest surroundings. “What was I thinking, what have we done….”

_Keep moving_ , her inner voice urged. _Can’t stay here_.

_He’s coming_.

The panic surged again, the primal urge to flee from danger. Her rational mind was overwhelmed, its uncertain arguments pushed aside. She _woged_ again, ears swiveled forward, listening as hard as she could.

She thought she heard something splashing downstream, moving in her direction.

_Downstream_ …again the image of the dead fox on the trail filled her mind, now imposed over her Other’s terrified vision of herself lying on the wet ground, gutted and eaten, throat savaged…and then in that vision she opened eyes filled with agony, awake and aware through her horrible suffering.

She muffled a shriek and started running, ears pointed back to listen for pursuit.

The ground began to rise a little as she ran desperately upstream. The dense willow thickets thinned a bit, making way for larger trees that stood among rocky outcroppings. But there was still only one direction she could go, hemmed in by steep embankments and tumbled boulders carried there by past storms and floods.

The creek spread wider and shallower here, barely ankle deep as she ran splashing up its center in the forlorn hope he couldn’t track her through it. Maybe she was near its source, perhaps a spring with rising ground around it, with other ways to run and use her tricks to get away.

These thoughts were wordless, vivid fragmented memories of ways to confuse her trail and strategies to be applied to her surroundings.

More thickets and stands of slender alder saplings loomed ahead. Blinded by terror she pushed through them, only to find more. On hands and knees she crawled through the underbrush, frantic to escape, and finally emerged into a densely shaded cove.

It might have seemed idyllic in far different circumstances. She faced a wall of slippery black rock covered with delicate ferns and mosses, rivulets of clear water streaming down its face. But she looked around wild-eyed and realized she was blocked on either side by tumbled boulders, impenetrably dense thickets and tangled trees. She had run into another dead end.

And he was running toward her. She heard him splashing up the creek, much closer now. It would not be long.

Her inner vixen had no answers; she could only await her fate, try to fight, struggle to the last to escape. Blood pounded in her ears, adrenaline and terror giving her vertigo. She staggered, driven to run but with nowhere to go.

_I would never hunt you, love. Never going to happen_...

Claiming her attention as her Other froze, Rosalee’s human mind clung to that memory, needing it to be true. Her last and only hope.

He was almost there. She heard him forcing and stomping his way through the young alders and dense thickets not caring how much noise he made, knowing this hunt was nearly ended. Fighting mindless panic, she gathered the last remnants of her wits and courage, stopped and turned to face the charging threat, struggling to form words.

Holding her arms out, palms pointed up as he crashed through the last low branches and underbrush, she _unwoged_ and shrieked, “Monroe – _STOP! Please…!”_

Eyes blazing red, fully _woged_ and poised to pounce, he barely caught himself, freezing in place as she burst into tears.

_“I feel like prey!”_ Sobbing with fear, she crumpled to her knees and hugged herself defensively as if her crossed arms could protect her soft vitals from his attack, her wild, wide eyes fixed on the charging Blutbad.

Horrified, Monroe immediately _unwoged_ and held absolutely still where he was, bracing to keep his balance. “Rosalee, no – _never!”_

His expression stricken, he lowered and softened his voice, his brown eyes gentle, hands down and spread in a calming gesture. “Honey, I’m so sorry. That went way too far. I didn’t realize….”

Rosalee shook her head, trying to stop the tears and convince her overwhelmed instincts that this was _her Monroe_ , not the relentless predator about to rip her apart like that poor dead fox. She focused on his human form, but her more primitive self still saw the monster within and screamed to her how quickly he could morph back into it again.

“Rosalee, it’s _me_. It’s just me. I love you.” He spoke softly, trying to soothe her with his voice. “I would _never_ hurt you. You’ll always be safe with me.” But when he started to move toward her she flinched back, trembling like a wild creature about to sprint away in panic.

Looking into her frightened eyes he said again even more softly, “It’s…just…me,” and very slowly sank to his knees, easing all the way down until their eyes were level, his hands resting open on his thighs.

He thought he saw her coming back to herself as he gazed steadily into her eyes, now that they were both in human form and kneeling on the ground. But he waited, not reaching out for her until he sensed she was ready.

“Monroe….” Her voice was high, strained, breathy.

“Yes. It’s over. You’re safe.”

“I’m sorry.” Tears welled through her lashes and she blinked fast as they spilled down her face. “I thought I could….”

“No, _I’m_ sorry. It was too much, I never should’ve – ”

She shook her head as she struggled for composure, arms stilled wrapped tightly around herself. “I was fine at first…I really was….” Her voice quavered, then steadied a bit. “It was fun laying false trails and…spying on you when you went by.”

Sitting very still, Monroe nodded and gave her an encouraging little smile. “Tricky…you really had me going for awhile there.”

“I started out feeling like a kid again, running with my cousins, messing up the foxhounds.” Her words spilled fast between gasping breaths. “And then I was thinking about how thrilling it’d be when you caught me, imagining what you were going to do.”

“Okay.” He watched her reactions closely.

“But all the sudden it hit me – I was alone, running in the forest, being chased. I couldn’t hear you any more, I didn’t know how close you were…and I couldn’t make myself stop running to be still and…and _reason_. Something else took over….”

Smile gone, Monroe let out a soft breath and briefly closed his eyes with understanding before looking back at her.

She stopped and swallowed hard to force down the fear and the quaver in her voice. “This…primal terror surged through me and I just lost it. My Other self was so afraid of you, afraid I’d be torn to pieces. Irrational, but….”

“Not really. Not on that level. If we weren’t who we are to each other, if we weren’t our rational selves, your Other would be right to be afraid.” He leaned toward her, just a little, voice earnest. “But Rosalee, honey – the most important thing, remember. _You_ are always my mate, never prey.”

She nodded, biting her lips, blinking rapidly as fresh tears spilled from her eyes, and this time she didn’t shy away when he moved slowly toward her on his knees.

When he opened his arms she collapsed into them, trembling violently at first from shock and cold, resting her arms and face against his chest as he enfolded her and rocked her gently, still murmuring, “Always mate, never prey. It’s only me, honey. I would never, ever hurt you.”

He stroked her soothingly, smoothing and kissing her hair while her trembling gradually subsided, her body recovering from its fight-or-flight adrenaline surge and her rational self taking control again.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “I had no idea I’d react that way. I hadn’t really thought through how different we are. Angelina knew she could hold her own against you….”

“Oh, baby – and then some!”

“But I found out, on a visceral level, I can’t. It’s not in my nature. Run, hide, divert the threat with tricks and false trails, yes. But full-on pursuit was too much. You were right to be reluctant about this.”

“You’re so feisty and ready to leap into a fight when you need to, and you seemed to want this so much, I thought, well…maybe.” He spoke softly into her hair as he carefully raised them both to their feet, arms wrapped tightly around each other. “But we have limits because of our differences, and we’re still finding out what those limits are. Obviously we just ran face-first into this one.”

“It didn’t hit until I realized I was trapped here, nowhere I could get away in time and you were just about to catch me.”

“I was a second away from pouncing and taking you down. Not the most comfortable spot in the forest we could have landed for a love tryst.” He looked around at the slippery wet rocks, fallen branches and swampy patches of mud and moss where the water trickling down the rock face was pooling. “Would’ve been more like mud wrestling.”

Rosalee couldn’t help a choking laugh in spite of her distress and leaned back to look up at him, her face still wet with tears. “How can you make me laugh when just a minute ago I was in a full-blown panic, terrified of you?”

“Just making an observation. Been there, done that, not the best erotic experience, I can tell you.”

“I’ll take your word for it this time.”

A misty drizzle started to fall, plastering their hair to their faces. He tenderly wiped the rain and tears from her face and bent to kiss her, his wet beard tickling her skin. Their lips were warm but the rest of their bodies were starting to feel the chill.

As Rosalee’s hands clasped behind his neck, pressing him down to continue the kiss, he murmured, “Suggestion.”

“Okay?”

“Let’s go back to where we stashed our stuff, put on some dry clothes and rain gear, drink that coffee in the Thermoses to warm up and just take a nice leisurely walk back to the car to settle down, enjoy the scenery.”

“That sounds entirely too sensible. Let’s do it.”

They started back hand in hand, following the trails they’d made in their headlong dash through the woods. Walking helped warm them up, though their wet shirts and jeans did nothing to retain the warmth. She shivered, looking up at the dense tree canopy and glimpses of heavy dark clouds above.

“It is beautiful. Even when it’s scary.”

“It is. Ma Nature has a terrible beauty, and she just doesn’t care. _La Belle Dame sans merci_. It’s important to remember that. People get infected with hubris, thinking we’ve got it all nearly under control. We don’t. ”

“She may not care about us as individuals, but I do think she cares about life on the grand scale. Keeping it going.”

“Ah, the Gaia theory, Mother Earth preserving the web of life even if some malfunctioning parts of it have to be eliminated? Can I give her my wish list?”

“You can try. But I’m afraid we’re already on hers.”

“At this point I’m hoping we’re at least just on the provisional watch list, rather than the ‘well, that didn’t work out, it’s got to go’ list.”

Rosalee chuckled darkly. “Well, at least we’re keeping Portland weird and green.”

“It’s a start. By the way,” he said, holding his arm out to stop her and looking around as they were about to ford a fast-flowing stream. “What the hell did you do here? I was hot on your trail and then all the sudden you just seemed to levitate into thin air and disappear. I went up and down the stream a couple hundred yards, so you didn’t just run through the water and climb out somewhere else. Nothing hanging in the air, either, and until then you were _strong_.”

“You think _now_ I’m giving away my secrets?” She gave him a toothy grin.

“Vixen.”

“Big bad wolf!” She laughed again. “But you found my trail again, obviously.”

“Yeah, but more by tracking than scent for awhile. You know, bent twigs, occasional boot print in the mud. Slowed me down awhile ’cause the tracks and scent kept disappearing.”

“ _Sooo_ not telling.”

“Fine. Never trust the Irish.” He started walking again, guiding them back toward their starting point.

Rosalee fell in step beside him. “Especially the Fuchsbau Irish.”

“With the Dutch head for business from your other grandparents. Dangerous combination. What have I gotten myself into?”

“Life without possibility of parole. That’s what the vows were for.”

“Damn. Always read the fine print, Monroe.”

“Mmmhmm. You helped write them.”

He squeezed her hand with a wry smile. “Oh, yeah. I did, didn’t I?”

 

The walk back took another thirty minutes. Rosalee was surprised they’d run so far; it seemed a lot longer trudging back in the chilling rain and wet clothes. When they at last reached their sheltered cache Monroe pulled their umbrellas from their packs and popped them open, wedging them overhead in tree branches to give them some shelter from the sporadic drizzle.

“Now the not so fun part, peeling out of wet clothes and trying to towel off a bit before climbing into the dry ones.” He unbuttoned his sodden shirt and started pulling it off, bare-chested in the cold air. Their breath made puffs of fog. He looked at Rosalee and raised his eyebrows.

She sighed and started working her wet long-sleeved tee up her back and over her bra, then above her head. The sleeves stuck to her skin and turned inside out as she pulled them free of her arms.

Monroe’s eyes were dancing with amusement as he watched her undress while he unlaced his boots and tugged them off, standing on the spongy leaf mulch in damp sock feet.

“Pants next. Well, after boots.”

He was scrunching his wet jeans down and over his feet as she did the same. When she straightened up she couldn’t help bursting out laughing as they stood there looking at each other shivering in their rain-soaked underwear and sock feet, sheltering under the umbrellas.

“How could I have thought this was romantic?” she gasped, reaching for a towel from her pack and blotting water off her skin.

Monroe was laughing, too, happy to see her recovered from her panic and giggling now at the ridiculousness of their situation. “It really helps if it’s not raining, and hasn’t rained long enough for the top layers of duff to dry. Which around here is hardly ever, except maybe a week or two in high summer.”

“So why the thing with forest running? Was it less miserable than this?”

“No, every bit as miserable except for the rare dry spell. We were just too bat-shit crazy and feral to know how miserable it was. It helps if you’re _woged_ and pretty much oblivious to anything else but the hunt or pouncing on your lover. But the mornings after, oh, man. Totally not recommended.”

“We have a nice, warm house and a nice, dry bed waiting for us back in town. Not to mention a glorious hot shower. I think I’ve had enough of a nature fix to last me a little while.”

“No more Nature Deficit Disorder?”

“I’m good for now. _Note to self:_ lower dose next time, this had unwanted side effects.”

“Apothecary, heal thyself.” He chuckled as he pulled on dry shorts, jeans, tee and sweatshirt and a warm jacket, tucking his T-shirt in before zipping up and lacing his belt through its loops. He admired the view of Rosalee slipping out of her wet bra and undies, stepping into fresh panties and jeans but just pulling on layers of shirts and her jacket over her bare chest.

“I didn’t think to pack another bra, so I’ll just have to let the girls go free.”

“No complaints from me.”

“Home now? Good.”

They gathered up their packs, plastic bags of wet clothes and the umbrellas and started back toward her car, a pathless two miles distant.

“I’m thinking maybe it’s a good night for a fire in the bedroom fireplace,” Monroe mused. “Haven’t done that since New Year’s. Maybe take some dinner and wine up there, throw that old thrift store fake-fur bedspread on the floor and play cave Wesen, if you’re still craving a bit of the wild.”

“Sounds about as uncivilized as I want to get at this point. Let’s get started back to our ‘cave’.” She took the lead following their own faint tracks back toward the road, smiling as she felt his re-aroused presence following close behind her.

They hiked along in silence for a while over the twigs and fallen leaves, each keeping their own counsel as they walked away from the traumatic incident that had spoiled their much-anticipated erotic fun. Rosalee tried to put the image of the eviscerated fox from her mind and concentrated instead on the more benign scents and sounds of the forest surrounding them, the vivid shades of green, the cool damp air on her face, the bright overcast sky.

But when the silence between them began to feel a little strained, as if neither knew what else to say, Rosalee ventured, “Did you smell the Jägerbars following that mama bear and her cubs when you were tracking me?”

“Smell them? They nearly knocked out the olfactory center of my brain!” Monroe said, grateful for the safe topic of conversation. “What, did they take a ritual bath in that stuff before they came out here? Imagine what it smelled like in their car driving up!”

“Oh, my god, I’m gagging just thinking about it. I’ll bet the bears put a real move on to stay far ahead of that reek.”

“When I was a teen, it was Old Spice. This is even worse.”

The trees and undergrowth were less dense here so he could move up and walk beside her; she seemed much recovered but he still wasn’t completely sanguine about following so close behind her. “What about the Wildermanner? Did you cross their trail?”

“Yes, seemed they’re headed further into the back country. She’s in estrus so they’re probably out here to do what we were…going to do before I freaked out,” Rosalee said, the last part apologetically.

“You could tell that?” He left the rest of her comment alone.

“I’m pretty sure. I can tell the difference in my own scent when I’m fertile.”

_So can I_ , Monroe thought, but decided to keep that observation to himself. “I’ve only met a couple of Wildermanner women before, at group and with my friend Larry. They all have this kind of combined primate and forest scent going on, almost like they’re part human, part animal, part tree…at least, to me.”

“Yeah, that’s kind of it. Like a particularly redolent human rolled around in conifer resin and damp mulch.”

Monroe laughed and then gave a deep sigh, shaking his head. “That fits with what Larry told me about the old-time Wildermanner, before they came in from the woods and started living among the Kehrseiten, under the radar…long before there was such a thing as radar, of course. He said they used to wear skins and furs and covered themselves with moss and twigs and leaves and stuff for camo, real hard to see if they didn’t want to be seen.”

He smiled at the bittersweet memory of his earnest and boisterous friend bringing his laptop to the support group at Helvetia Tavern to share his ancient heritage with Monroe and other Wesen during their beer-and-burger time after their _wieder_ meeting. “He showed me pictures of a bunch of medieval and Renaissance statues and paintings of ‘wild men’ that supposedly were inspired by the few Wildermanner that villagers encountered…and lived to tell their stories.”

“Yeah. I’ve seen some of those in books, and up close at the main doors of Hearst Castle in San Simeon,” Rosalee said. “They’re usually portrayed as giants with big clubs or spears, long hair, bushy beards.”

“So, your typical Wildermanner.”

“I’ve never met or heard of one who was exactly petite. Even the women.”

“Well, more so now than the old days. Apparently they’ve intermixed with Kehrseiten more commonly than most other Wesen from what Larry and Dan said – pioneers, fur trappers, lumberjacks…more back-to-nature homesteader types now. That doctor who was testing out his homemade _woge_ -suppressant on himself and Larry and two other Wildermanner I knew from Helvetia – he wasn’t noticeably tall and broad like Larry. Except when his _woge_ took over and he went all ‘berserker’ right in downtown Portland.”

“ _That_ was quite a Nick adventure. The media were going bug-fuck over the ‘Bigfoot’ scare.”

“Yeah, that’s when poor Hank got an eyeful _twice_ that he couldn’t wrap his mind around. First me pretending to be Larry, diverting the search dogs and running over him, then Doc Brinkerhoff on the rampage before they shot him.”

She shook her head. “That all seems like such a long time ago now. We’ve all been through so much these past few years.”

Monroe put a careful arm around her shoulders as they walked and asked softly, “You doing okay now?”

Looking down, she nodded, remorseful. “Yeah, I’m better. I’m so sorry, Monroe, I ruined everything. After all the fun we had planning and teasing each other, all the build up – then the real thing, it just got away from me.”

He hugged her briefly and left his hand resting protectively on her shoulder. “Tell me if it’s too soon to talk about, but…when did it stop being fun? Do you remember what flipped it, or was it kind of gradual, snuck up on you? I don’t want to make that mistake again.”

She was quiet for a minute, mulling it over as they walked together, trying to remember when her wild side had gone into flee-or-perish mode. “When I was focused on tricking you, devising ways to put you off my trail, it was great.” She flashed a wide smile at the memory. “And I was loving being out in the wild, everything so fresh and unspoiled, not a trace of other people, not even a gum wrapper or a boot print. Especially when I could hear you in the distance or spied on you from up high.”

“You were watching me fall for your misdirections? Man, talk about sneaky!”

“That was the best part running with my cousins, hiding and watching our victims fall for our tricks.”

“So far, so good…and I must say, I got a kick out of the challenge when I realized what you were up to.”

“I didn’t want it to be too easy for you, have it all over too soon…but then it went on too long instead and I hadn’t counted on my deepest instincts turning against me.”

“So maybe it was just running too long _woged_ and the wild side kind of took over?”

She slowed her pace, thinking, then stopped, Monroe halting just a step ahead and turning to face her.

“There was something,” she confessed, “disturbing. It bothered me at the time but…the forest is full of dead things, it’s part of nature, to be expected. I didn’t realize how much it must have affected me, subconsciously.”

“A dead…animal?”

“Yeah, and when I think back, I was flashing on it the whole time I was running from you scared for my life. It was – primitive, I wasn’t thinking in words any more.”

“I know what that’s like,” he said, nodding. “But…from the hunter’s side.”

She turned wide eyes up to look at him. “Freddy and I hunted when we were out boon-docking; not big things, just rabbits, field mice, fish, birds. But I never went all nonverbal like that inside...even _pre_ -verbal.”

Monroe reached out and clasped his hands around her arms gently just below her shoulders, nodding his understanding. “It’s a weird headspace. It is primitive, and I have hunted like that way back, even before I went off the deep end. That’s not what was going on today; I don’t go there any more. I can’t risk it.” He gave her arms a light squeeze and smiled. “I was thinking very clearly in words and pictures exactly what I had in mind for you when I finally caught you.”

She smiled back but her lips trembled. “I think it’s because what I saw…if it was just a rabbit or squirrel or even a deer or something, maybe it wouldn’t have gotten to me….”

Monroe caught his breath and closed his eyes briefly. “Oh, no….”

“Maybe you ran past it, too. It was a…what was left of a…fox.”

“Fox,” he finished with her, shaking his head. “Damn – of all the creatures that live in this forest. No, I didn’t see it. If I’d known, I would have called off the chase. No wonder your inner Fuchsbau wigged out.”

“It was pretty gruesome. I have no idea what got it, but it was a…very messy eater. And the leftovers had been there awhile.” She squeezed her eyes shut against the unwanted image and shook her head. “I know a lot of predators take out foxes…and I also know my kind are vulnerable to a lot of Wesen predators, too. I guess deep down in my weird mixed-up genes, I really identified with that poor mauled fox.”

“And natural wolves and foxes never mate. Your vixen couldn’t recognize me as your lover, not your killer.” Monroe sighed. “We are an aberration, honey; we know we’re breaking the rules. Some of them made up and imposed on us by other people…and some of them unfortunately grounded in nature. Living urban and modern like we do, it’s easier to forget about the latter.”

“I just wish we could have had our run without me stumbling over that traumatic reminder. I think I would have been fine without that. It was a little scary but exciting – not terrifying, until the end when I was trapped.”

“As fate would have it. We should have done a role reversal, have you chase me instead.” He gave her a regretful smile. “I wish I’d thought of that.”

“It wouldn’t be the same, though,” she sighed. “I wanted to be like your Blutbad girlfriends were for you.”

He tilted his head aside, one eyebrow lowered, his smile quirked sideways. “You think they never chased _me?_ Oh, man – if you only knew!”

She looked surprised for a quick moment, taking in that news. “Really? But…even so, I wouldn’t be a real threat to you.”

“Oh, yeah? Tell that to Riker, if he can hear you from _Hell_.” His face was serious now, the deadly memory of the Wesenrein tribunal haunting his eyes. “You took down a murderous unreformed Blutbad male in his prime, and he even had a gun. You had his throat torn out before I could get there and help. Don’t think I’ll ever forget that!”

She locked eyes with him, both of them reliving that fateful moment when either they or Riker were going to die. She blinked hard and swallowed. “I guess I did, huh? Because if you died, I didn’t want to live either. Nothing left to lose.”

“So, remind your inner vixen of that one for me, okay? She played her part but that was mostly you. And not pre-verbal either. You told him you were going to stop him, and you did.”

The haunted look left his eyes, replaced with admiration. “I know I get kind of overprotective at times; you give me that ‘I can take care of myself’ look and I know in most circumstances, you can. It’s just in my nature and the way I was brought up to protect my loved ones. I hope you know, I never mean to be patronizing or dominating – Mom would have me down on the floor with her jaws around my neck if I ever acted that way with her.”

Rosalee gave a rueful laugh at that and shook her head. Her petite yet powerful mother-in-law was a force to be reckoned with.

“I’m only attracted to strong women, Rosalee, always have been…well, since Molly. And of them all, you’re the very strongest, in every way that counts.”

“Not in brute strength and speed.”

“You make it up with rage and treachery.” He said it so seriously, fixing her with those intense brown eyes beneath his lowered brow, that the last word broke her up laughing.

It was a dark laugh filled with understanding.

“Okay…okay, I got it. I am a Fuchsbau, not a fox. And to _your_ Blutbad I’m your mate, and your equal – not prey.” Then she corrected, “The rational, cerebral me gets that; I just can’t be sure how deep it goes for my not-so-rational side.”

“We’ll just keep telling her, and showing her. We’ll get there; she’s no dummy. She’s just real heavy on the self-preservation side, and that’s not altogether a bad thing.”

“Especially with the kinds of ‘people’ we consort with.” She took his arm and started walking again. “Not always easy to tell friend from foe… _this_ week.”

“Depends on circumstances. But you can depend on me in any circumstances.”

“I know.” She hugged his arm. “Me, too, for you.”

“I know.” He leaned over and kissed her hair, its brunette strands clumped together, dark and still dripping where they’d escaped her clip. “You’re still wet.”

“I am,” she agreed, grinning. “So are you,” nodding up at his frizzy damp waves as they walked away from their misadventure. But as they continued on companionably, holding hands, distress dissipated now, she began to realize she was still wet in more ways than one.

They came to a small meadow just as the sun broke through, its warmth streaming from a widening patch of blue sky.

“Of course,” Monroe said wryly, looking up. “It figures.” He drew her hand up and kissed her fingers. The warmth of his lips spread down her arm and through her body, making certain frustrated parts tingle.

Rosalee turned and stepped close to him, leaning up to claim those lips with her own kiss. Still holding his hand, she slid her other one through his beard and cupped his cheek while her mouth lingered on his, kissing the corners of his mouth, lower lip then upper, enjoying his surprised and pleased response.

“I’ll make it up to you. I promise.”

“I have no doubt.” His eyes were kind, loving, and resigned to waiting until they were snug and warm at home.

They continued walking, still a mile or so to go before they’d reach the car, both thinking about the long frustrating drive home.

After a few minutes, Monroe said, “I’m sure looking forward to that hot coffee. Not to mention ‘breakfast, the sequel’.” _At least I can satisfy one appetite right away_ , he thought, glancing sideways at his wife.

She was looking much improved, color in her cheeks, moving with renewed confidence and holding her head up as they briskly walked along.

“I’m getting warmed up again now, but, yeah, coffee will be great when we get there.” She didn’t miss the other hunger in Monroe’s glance, and that warmed her in a very different way. “How much further to the car, do you think?”

“At this pace, maybe another fifteen, twenty minutes.”

“Probably not much traffic on that little off-road track where we parked, right? Not likely to meet any other hikers.”

“Not this far back. I’m thinking maybe we should have let somebody know where we were going, just in case something bad happened.” He shook his head at this lapse in safety protocol. “I just didn’t want us to be, you know, disturbed.”

Now that Rosalee was obviously feeling better, he felt the disappointment and frustration welling up inside; he’d been looking forward to their much-anticipated sexual adventure even more than he’d realized. They’d come so close – but at least he’d been able to stop himself just in time.

“More likely whoever stumbled on _us_ would be disturbed.” She said it lightly with a ghost of her saucy smile returning.

“Well, no danger of that now,” he said, and instantly regretted the note of disappointment that he heard in his own voice.

She didn’t seem to notice, instead scanning their surroundings with an herbalist’s eye. “In a couple of months this place will really be nature’s pharmacy,” she said. “Even more so in late summer. It’s remote enough that illegal collectors haven’t ravaged the endangered species, yet.”

Then she stopped and pointed toward a thicket of young trees encroaching on the meadow’s edge, reaching for the sun beyond their established elders’ shadows. “Wow…is that what I think it is? Hard to be sure from this distance, but…”

Surprised, he stopped and turned in the direction she was pointing. “What?”

“Is that a wild patch of _burdock_ over there?”

Shading his eyes with one hand, he peered intently toward the thicket. “That’s the stuff I foraged for Holly Clark that time, to help with her pain and fever.” He took a few steps in that direction, trying to spot the patch Rosalee had seen and getting caught up in his memories. “We were too remote for cell service. Nick went to get help but it was going to take a long time and she was really suffering; she’d been shot and the wound was infected. So I went back to a burdock plant I’d spotted on our way in – I’d learned to recognize it in Scouts, and cut some of the root for her to chew…it has that analgesic, anti-inflammatory effect on Blutbaden, you know. Not so much with other species, but then you’d know that better than most….”

But when he belatedly realized she wasn’t responding to his excited monologue, he turned to look at her.

She was gone.

“What the… _Rosalee?”_

He quickly scanned the whole area but there was no sign of her. The edges of the meadow were dense with saplings and understory shrubs hungry for sunlight, their thick growth merging with tall meadow grasses and tangled brambles just starting to leaf out amid their thorns.

“Rosalee!” No answer; not a sound.

Stunned, he looked back the way they’d come and ahead toward the car; she was in neither of those relatively clear spaces and hadn’t had time to run out of sight either direction. She must have taken off into the forest beyond the meadow…or someone, something had taken her.

At that panicked thought he breathed in deeply, seeking the scent of any silent intruder. But the only large animal scents were his own and Rosalee’s.

He’d just started to realize what had happened when he heard a familiar high-spirited “yip” in the distance.

Nonplussed for a moment, he tried to discern which direction it came from in the expanse of woods across the meadow, knowing only where she _hadn’t_ gone. But why…?

When it dawned on him, he shook his head in disbelief. _“Really?”_

She was summoning him back to the chase.

Another Fuchsbau _yip_ , a sound she could only make _woged_ , floated above the trees, more distant than before. He sniffed again, moving off a few steps in its direction, searching the ground for signs of her passage. Her scent hung in the damp air, leading him toward the dense vegetation bordering the woods.

He felt his eyes blaze red and his hormones surge, the lust he’d had to bury so abruptly before now rising again, rekindled. “Okay, then,” he growled, “but this time, no quarter!”

He ran across the meadow following her scent and found the place where she’d squeezed through a thicket and darted around the rotting trunk of a massive fallen tree just beyond. He dropped his daypack and stopped long enough to shed his jacket, sweatshirt and belt in the shadows of the young trees before taking off after his wayward mate.

Her scent lingered in the air but wasn’t cueing her direction. Remembering her tree-climbing trick, he looked up, _woging_ to enhance his hunter’s senses. No good vantage points above, though her scent seemed to be hovering higher than ground level. He moved along the length of the deadfall, stepping up on one of its huge shattered branches to look over the fallen giant, searching for her trail on the other side.

No broken ground, no boot prints, no scattering of leaves…but his nose told him now. Her scent continued along the top of the dead tree’s trunk, a good eight feet above the forest floor. She’d used it like a freeway ramp through the dense understory, running its declining length toward its crown, leaping over segments of broken and decayed trunk.

He followed, running along the top of the trunk as fast as he could on the uneven surface, dodging thick stubs of broken branches and patches of slick damp moss and fungus eating away at the old tree’s corpse. Her scent ran true until the narrowing trunk was only about three feet off the ground; then she’d vaulted off to the left into the thick conifer duff and taken off into the more open forest under the deep shade of old growth trees, weaving between wide clumps of Jurassic-looking ferns.

Moving faster on the more level ground, Monroe kept her scent this time. She wasn’t using her foxy bag of tricks the way she had before with a much longer head start.

 

Rosalee ran for all she was worth, thrilled and laughing to herself. Still burdened with her daypack, she didn’t dare drop it along her trail; it would be a sure sign of her passage. Not that it would take him all that long to track her down.

At his shocked, then panicked yelling of her name when he realized she was gone, she’d had mercy on her worried lover and called back to him with her high vixen _yips_ , letting him know she’d come to no harm – and that the game was afoot. _Too bad_ , she thought, _he’ll just find me faster knowing which direction to look_.

She knew the cool, damp conditions would preserve her scent for him and she didn’t have time to get too fancy with her diversions. Bounding up on the massive fallen tree, she ran along its trunk as fast as she could, feeling exposed and way too visible until she found a good spot to jump down among the concealing ferns.

She crouched there and listened, catching her breath for a moment, and thought maybe she heard some rustling back by the meadow’s edge – he could be struggling through the thickets, trying to penetrate the forest’s natural barriers to follow her call and scent.

_That’s not all he’ll be trying to penetrate when he catches up,_ she thought, feeling a giddy surge of desire. Eyes bright amber now, she slithered away through the thick green fronds leaving no footprints on the damp forest litter between them.

The land sloped gently downward, most likely leading to a creek or stream. Mindful of the traps she’d run into before, Rosalee ran across the slope instead of down, giving up the advantage of running water to obscure her trail.

She wasn’t looking for escape.

She was seeking a good place to be ravished.

Monroe followed her strengthening scent across the face of the sloping land, his footfalls nearly silent on the dense mat of conifer needles decaying under the massive Douglas firs and competing cedars.

_Not heading down toward water this time, then,_ he thought, his mind straying briefly to the practical. _Good, we only brought one extra pair of dry boots._

But his intense focus on the object of his burning lust took over again and he _woged_ as he ran, knowing she was near. Wanting her to know he was close, warning her to prepare instead of bursting upon her unexpectedly, he voiced a low, deep howl that reverberated through the peaceful forest.

That howl penetrated Rosalee to her depths. She felt the heat rush to her face and sex, her pussy lips wet and swelling, her bouncing breasts aching, nipples erect. She’d run as far as she would go; looking around, she decided instantly that this was the perfect place.

Monroe shoved his way through interlocking evergreen branches that sloped to the ground, startling a small flock of gray birds foraging in their shelter. The birds burst outward in panicked flight, their wings beating loudly, and Monroe paused a moment, scanning the forest around him, anticipating they would in turn flush his sexual ‘prey’ from her hiding place. For she was close – very close.

A rush of redolent Fuchsbau musk filled the air; she had just _woged_ , briefly, releasing her Wesen aroma enhanced with the intoxicating scents of her arousal. It was all he could do to shake off his own _woge_ , not wanting to risk triggering another panic reaction by appearing suddenly and taking her down in his Blutbad form.

Striding forward now instead of running, he pushed through another tangle of branches and came out into a small clearing, sunlight beaming down in shafts of gold through the opening in the forest canopy.

Beyond stood a grove of western dogwoods, branches yet bare of leaves but thickly covered in their distinctive large white four-petalled blossoms. And under this secluded spring bower the object of his lust knelt on all fours in the thick spongy duff, her beautiful bottom toward him but looking back over her shoulder with come-hither eyes.

She wore nothing but skimpy red lace panties, her clothes hastily shed in a pile nearby. And as he emerged into the sunlight, their eyes met, locked on each other with overwhelming hunger.

Then her brown eyes flashed amber and she _woged_ , her bare body swiftly clothed in silky red and white fur. She flattened her sleek pointed ears and bared her sharp teeth, wrinkling her foxy muzzle to give a low throaty growl – and wantonly wiggling that delectable furry ass in invitation.

Eyes flaring red, Monroe strode fast across the clearing, unfastening his belt and unzipping his jeans as he went. She continued to wiggle enticingly…if she’d had a tail, she would be holding it aside, the canid signal she was ready and eager for mating.

But as he shoved his pants down out of the way, his throbbing erection free at last, she took advantage of the bunched clothing hobbling his progress, bounded to her feet and darted away with an excited, taunting _yip_.

“Oh, no…not this time!” Quickly he unlaced his boots and pulled off the impeding garments with them, then peeled off the shirt for good measure. "Old school it’ll be, then!"

Completely naked now, he _woged_ and felt the dark fur sprout and flow all over his body, claws and teeth grow sharp and bestial, ears expanding into long points and snout protruding. Launching in a blur of speed, his clawed toes digging into the forest mould, he took off after her with a roar.

The russet fur covering her back stood out in this part of the forest where the incense cedars were sparse, the other trees muted browns and grays. She zigzagged among them, swinging on trunks to make sharp turns, not looking back to see if he was gaining on her.

She was fast, faster than he’d imagined, light on her bare feet and extremely agile. He crashed through the trees after her, keeping her in sight ahead, completely focused on his quarry wherever she was headed.

Away from the clearing the canopy of trees closed over them again, the warming sun dimmed and filtered through their branches. Understory thickets grew dense in patches where the sunlight reached the ground; Rosalee diverted around them, gradually turning back toward the clearing as they blocked her passage.

The dogwood grove loomed ahead again as she ran, breathing fast with exertion and excitement. The crashing noise of his pursuit grew louder and then stopped – he had charged into the clearing close behind her. She resisted looking back to see how close he was until she couldn’t stand it any longer; she couldn’t hear him now but knew he’d be even faster unimpeded by the trees and undergrowth.

She glanced back over her shoulder just in time to see him soaring through the air, eyes blazing, jaws wide and leering, body covered in fur and nothing else, his arms outstretched and clawed hands reaching for her.

She voiced her distinctive vixen scream, an unearthly mix of human and vulpine sound, and barely made it to the scant cover of the blooming dogwoods before he was on her, strong arms locked around her body pinning her arms to her sides and the momentum of his pounce taking them both down into the moist duff with a thud.

He turned their bodies together as they fell so they landed more side by side than with him on top of her, but there the gallantry ended; with a victor’s roar, he rolled her over face down and covered her with his body, rigid cock pressed to her bottom, and pinned her arms to the ground.

She shrieked and giggled, squirming in his iron grasp, knowing full well her struggles were futile. With one arm resting across her back, his claws drew her hair away from her neck and he closed his jaws over her exposed nape, now covered in sleek red fur.

She shivered deliciously as she felt the tips of his sharp fangs dent her sensitive skin, and relaxed in submission. He rumbled and licked her neck before releasing her from the love bite, moving on to the business at hand.

Face and bare body pressed to the damp ground beneath his weight, she had to agree with his warning that the duff wasn’t as soft as it looked.

Powerful hands gripping her body, claws prickling just enough, he moved down the length of her nuzzling and nipping along her back, fondling the bulging sides of her compressed breasts and moving his hands downward as he went until suddenly he seized her waist and lifted her to her knees, her head and shoulders still on the ground. She twisted her head around so she could see him and whatever he was about to do to her.

Fixing his glowing red eyes on her, he snarled, the sound fading to a deep throbbing in his throat, clawed hands now gripping her thighs. She trembled with excitement and need, her own claws digging into the duff, bracing herself.

Eyes still locked to hers, he snagged the side of her panties between his fangs and with a jerk of his head, ripped the delicate scarlet lace apart. She gave a startled yip and tried to get her arms under her but to no avail; he caught the torn lace in his teeth and, shaking his wolfish head rapidly side to side, rent the panties to shreds, claws of one hand tugging their remains from between her legs and tossing them away.

Then those bestial clawed hands were pressing her thighs apart, the leathery pads of his Blutbad fingertips sliding between her legs and stroking her engorged pussy lips, probing to rub her throbbing clit and spread her own dripping wetness over that sensitive nub and her fur fringed labia while he held her in place with one strong arm locked around her waist.

She whimpered while he explored her, trembling with the delicious agony of her need and the thrilling anticipation of being taken. He teased her unmercifully, tugging at the red fur along her outer lips and soft mound, other hand raking his claws along her inner thighs before gripping her rounded bottom. Then rising on his knees, he rubbed that fierce erection against her hips, making her feel the size of the organ about to plow her swollen furrow.

She arched her back and tried to lift up on her elbows to have a little more control in their joining, but he growled in ardent amusement, “Ohhh, no,” lifting her by her thighs so her arms collapsed under her, and piercing her with a deep thrust that rocked her whole body forward with the force of his penetration.

Her love muscles seized around him and she shrieked in surprise, delight and relief as he filled her so roughly, withdrew and filled her again and again. His powerful arms locked around her, holding her exactly where he wanted her while he had his wicked way at last, and she succumbed gladly to his lusty embrace.

Monroe reamed her slick pussy without mercy, enjoying Rosalee’s moans and cries of submission and pleasure and feeling her move as best she could to meet his thrusts in this position. Enjoying his victory in their lovers’ hunt, he made good on his promise that she would pay for all the teasing and frustration, letting her feel his full Blutbad strength as he plunged his engorged cock into her hot velvety wetness, feeling her relax to receive him and squeeze around him each time he pulled back to thrust again.

His wolf was wild with the mating frenzy and he let that inner beast go, yelping and snarling, knowing that in the heat of their passion she could take it and, more than that, she wanted it.

Head down now, forearms and knees braced on the ground, Rosalee gave herself over to the rising heat and tension in her sex as Monroe released his pent-up lust into her body. She heard a long, low animal moan rising and realized the sound was coming from her own throat as the first, most powerful surge of pleasure crested through her.

It forced that vixen scream from her again as the intense orgasm overtook her, vaginal muscles spasming hard and fast, gripping his thick cock as he kept thrusting, riding her while she came, grasping and stroking her bottom with his claws. Lost in that nonverbal Other headspace again, her inner Fuchsbau gave herself over completely to this forceful coupling with her mate.

Gasping as the final clenching spasms faded, she felt her legs go weak from the overwhelming climax and his vigorous assault; it was all she could do not to collapse under him. Feeling her wobble a bit, Monroe gave a short growling laugh and tightened his grip on her, holding her up. “Not so fast…not yet…”

Unable to speak, she nodded her consent, breath coming hard and fast, face turned to the side and eyes closed, focused entirely on the intense sensations in her body. It was several moments before she regained control of her spent cunt muscles to grip his plunging cock again.

“Ohhhh, you’re back!” he rumbled in appreciation as she squeezed him deep inside. She nodded mutely, smile tugging at the corners of her parted lips. He slowed his thrusting, making her feel every inch of him moving in and out of her wet sheath, enjoying the way she yielded to let him in and then clenched on his withdrawals.

Gradually he increased the pace and force again as his own long-awaited climax built within him, need and desire burning in his loins, balls tightening and lifting as the hot surge of ecstasy at last erupted through him and into her.

He cried out, the sound a strangled roar that frightened birds from the nearby trees and sent every small mammal in the vicinity scampering to safety, and with each powerful wave of pleasure kept pumping his thick seed into her with his final thrusts before slumping down over his lover’s body.

Still _woged_ and joined in the manner of canid species and most other non-primate mammals when mating, they sank down together on the damp woodland duff, not yet aware of the conifer needles poking through the thinner expanses of their fur. Both were panting hard from their excitement and exertions, Monroe covering Rosalee completely now but taking his upper body weight on his forearms so she could breathe.

He kissed her neck and nibbled the velvety fur along the rim of her upturned pointed ear, reaching over to close his hand over hers. She spread her fingers and he slid his between them, both of them clasping hands.

“Don’t change yet,” she murmured. “I want to keep you inside me.”

He chuckled, stroking her hair with his claws. “You usually do when we get furry.”

He moved gently within her, still hard despite his thundering orgasm thanks to that special bone his Blutbad _woge_ formed during sex. _One of the odd benefits_ , he mused, enjoying their post climax pleasuring; then briefly and not for the first time, hoped none of Nick’s Grimm books mentioned anything about that very personal detail of Blutbad physiology, or Fuchsbau either for that matter.

Monroe had never checked, but then Nick was usually around when they hit the books for research. There was no logical reason for Monroe to be looking up Blutbad lore, _except maybe to check for accuracy_ , he thought defensively before banishing those thoughts from this delicious moment of spent intimacy.

Sliding one leg over hers, he eased them over on their sides so he was spooning her as if holding her on his lap. She tightened her love muscles around him as they moved, holding him securely inside and drew his arms around her snugly, cuddling back against him and resting her head against his shoulder.

He hugged her before working one hand free to stroke the sleek white fur on her chest, breasts and belly, all the way down to the reddish patch above the joining of her thighs.  

“You are really beautiful all over, you know?” His voice was gravelly in his Blutbad form, yet soft and gentle as he could make it.

She smiled and rubbed her furry face against his shoulder. “I’m glad you think so. Not many men would find a red beard on their wives attractive.”

They both laughed softly and he reached up to stroke the fringe of rust red hairs along her jaw line, then trailed his fingertips and claws along the curve of her white throat. “Whiskers, maybe, not really a full beard,” he teased.

“No, it’s a beard, longer than lots of Portland hipsters’,” she insisted, grinning, her broad smile exposing her needle sharp teeth.

“Point taken.”

She reached back and stroked his thick bristly dark beard, longer, denser and more wiry than in his human form, then further up to rake her clawed fingertips through his wild shock of Blutbad hair, tracing the edge of its widow’s peak on his forehead. Then she ran her fingers over the pronounced ridges and furrows of his fearsome wolfish face to rest on his lips. He took her fingertips into his mouth and closed his jagged teeth on them gently.

“Mmmm.” She closed her eyes again with pleasure, squeezing his other hand that she still held clasped in her own. “This really isn’t so bad after all.”

“It doesn’t suck,” he agreed, releasing her fingertips. “As long as it’s not raining.”

“That helps.” She reached back and scratched behind his pointed ear in that special spot he liked so much when _woged_ , using just the tips of her curved claws.

He caressed the length of her body again, stroking the silky fur and gliding his hand over her breast to find the pink nipple protruding from the soft mound of white hairs. He tweaked it gently and rolled it between his fingertips, feeling it go hard at his touch.

“No fair,” she giggled. “No way am I ready to go again! Not yet.”

“Just playing. I love exploring your body while you’re _woged_. We don’t usually hold it this long.”

“Today is special. It just feels right somehow, lying out here under the trees away from anyone else.” Then, brows knitting at the thought, “unless it’s too risky for you.”

“Nah, not just ‘basking in the afterglow’ like this. I’m good.”

“Very, very good…especially when you’re _very, very bad_.”

“Warned you…”

“Yeah, you did. _She_ got the message this time.”

“Yeah, and by the way…” Monroe gave her hip a light smack. “You scared the hell out of me disappearing like that! First you get me going with the fake burdock sighting…”

“I knew you’d fall for that and launch into the whole Holly Clark story so I’d have enough time to sneak away and make a run for the woods.”

“Devious little…” he grumbled some rude silly words into her hair as she laughed at him. “For a moment I was terrified something had ambushed us and dragged you away so fast I couldn’t hear it! But all I could smell was us.”

“That’s why I yipped a lot sooner than I’d intended; I could hear the stress in your voice. So I really had to turn on the afterburners to gain some distance after letting you know which way to come for me.”

“Oh, I _came_ for you all right. You didn’t do so bad yourself.”

They laughed again together, making Rosalee involuntarily squeeze him again inside her. “I think I might have a little trouble walking back after all that!” she admitted.

“We’ll take it easy. In fact,” he glanced skyward, “we should probably start, you know…winding down so we can get back into our clothes again. We really don’t want to be way out here after dark.”

“No – definitely not.” Reluctantly she relaxed and eased forward as Monroe withdrew from her, still erect, though that would change when he _woged_ back to human.

She turned over to face him and ran her clawed hands down his hairy chest, then reached around to stroke his back where his pelt was thicker and less wiry. She sank her claws in, raking his back and shoulders with their tips and he arched with pleasure, returning the favor with his own claws but finishing with his hands cupped over her ass and stroking its furry cheeks.

“We bring a new meaning to ‘heavy petting’,” she teased, tangling her fingers in his dense fur, and he laughed out loud, reaching up to press a fingertip to her pointy black nose.

“That we do.”

A stiff breeze blew up then, rustling leaves and making the Doug-fir branches above the dogwoods swirl and sway, showering them with cold droplets from the earlier rain and leaving wet splashes on their fur.

“Okay, okay, Ma!” Monroe called out to the forest. “We get the message; time to go.” He sat up and looked down at Rosalee, both reluctant now for their forest run to come to an end.

She sat up, too but leaned in close, rubbing her foxy nose against his Blutbad snout. “One more kiss,” she said, “like this.”

They pressed their mouths together, then their bodies, wrapping their arms around each other as they devoured each other’s lips, tongues meeting, teasing, exploring inside each other’s fanged mouths and finishing with a warm, loving kiss. Then, with a sigh, Monroe shook off his _woge_ and watched his beloved do that languid toss of her head that brought on the surge to morph into her different form.

“I love the way you do that. So…sensuous.”

She smiled. “I practiced a zillion times in front of a mirror when I was a teen, trying to make it all fluid and sexy. Now it’s second nature.”

“Well, you succeeded. Except when you’re pissed, then it’s like, RRRRRR!” He grinned, showing teeth. “There’s no way to make it seductive when I do it.”

“Seductive, maybe not, but exciting – hell, yes.” She twisted around, looking for her clothes. “Especially in the dark when all the sudden I see those red eyes glowing over me in bed, and…I feel you getting furry against my skin.”

She trailed a fingertip down the front of his body toward his now quiescent manhood and he caught her hand just as she reached his pubic hair.

“What, you haven’t had _enough_ today?” But his eyes were sparkling with mischief.

“Well, yes,” she conceded, “if I’m going to get back to the car under my own power.”

He stood, still holding her hand and she let him help her up, realizing she was a little more stiff and sore than she’d thought. They brushed bits of duff off their naked bodies where moments before it had been clinging to their fur, and Rosalee realized her knees and elbows were scraped a bit from the friction against the ground while they were going at it.

As she examined the red patches, Monroe touched one on her arm with regret. “Forest equivalent of rug burn,” he apologized. “Sorry about that. Next time you can be on top.”

When she widened her eyes at him, he finished, “Ah, if you ever want to do a next time.”

“Not right away,” she said. “But I might just take you up on that offer someday.”

Their eyes met and exchanged that promise.

“Um, I think we’d better go find our clothes,” he said after a moment. “It’s a long way down the mountain on not so easy roads and still a good walk back to the car.”

“I know.” She bent to gather up her jeans and shirts from the pile beside her daypack. “And what you said about being peckish afterward…I could eat that whole enormous breakfast all over again, plus at least a gallon of coffee.”

“That, and dinner,” he said. Then, standing there nude, shaking his head and looking her up and down with a serious expression, “But when we get home, first thing…”

She lowered an eyebrow and looked at him askance. “What?”

“We need to get naked again…”

“First thing? _Again?”_

“And thoroughly examine each other for ticks.”

She burst out laughing so hard she dropped the clothes and turned to hug him again in their bare skins. “You’re such a romantic!” she teased while he grinned down at her.

“Right?”

“And incorrigible!”

“I’ve been called that before. But I like the way you mean it.” He waggled his eyebrows at her again and then reached down for her pack while she collected her clothes and started putting them on, _sans_ panties and bra.

“Thanks to you, now I have to go home completely ‘commando’,” she said, tugging her jeans up and carefully zipping over her curly pubes. “ _I_ forgot an extra bra, but there’s nothing left of my panties now.”

“Bright red lace and not much of it,” he said, eyes glinting over his wide grin. “What did you expect would happen to them?”

It took them awhile to find all the lacey shreds so that they could responsibly "leave no trace".

 

They drank coffee and munched their breakfast leftovers from the antique picnic basket on their way down from the mountains, Rosalee taking her turn driving once Monroe got them back to the paved roads. He stretched out the best he could in the passenger seat of her little Fiat, but he was used to the fairly cramped space in his beloved VW anyway and if he’d been any more relaxed he would have fallen asleep – not fair to the equally spent driver.

The rain held off until they’d just reached the Portland city limits at dusk. Soon the gentle thrumming turned into a cascade of water sheeting down over the car’s windows and pounding on the roof, the wiper blades on max having a hard time keeping up.

“I have an idea,” Monroe shouted over the din. “Doubt either of us feels like cooking when we get home and Lotus is on the way…somewhere in all this.”

“Chinese takeout, perfect!” she shouted back. “I’ll just tack to starboard and see if I can dock while this monster tide’s coming in!”

The local mom-and-pop restaurant was nearly empty thanks to the heavy downpour, so they soon had their order and were on their winding way down Terwilliger Boulevard toward Southwest Ravensview and home, the delicious aromas of their favorite menu items filling the car.

Rosalee parked behind the faithful yellow Bug in the driveway and they dashed through the rain to the gray bungalow’s sheltering porch, clutching plastic bags of Chinese food and their essentials from the trip and yelling and shrieking like a pair of school age kids as they got soaked again.

Once inside, breathless and laughing, they put the bags down to shed their dripping jackets and hang them on the hooks near the door to dry.

“How ‘bout you grab some wine and I’ll go start a fire in the upstairs hearth?” Monroe suggested. “Help us dry off and thaw a little?”

“I will!” Rosalee said, eyes bright and cheeks rosy. “And don’t forget to drag that old fur bedspread into our cave while you’re at it.” She flashed _woged_ eyes at him before whirling to head for the kitchen.

Monroe smiled after her, deeply satisfied that their adventure had turned out so well after all and eager to continue their fun upstairs. Hearing the fridge open and close and the clink of glasses from the kitchen, he trotted the bags of hot food up to their private love nest.

It was going to be a dark and stormy night, of the very best kind.

**Author's Note:**

> Please let me know if you enjoyed the story (or not), what you liked about it (or didn't) and any other thoughts/comments that you want to share. Feedback is VERY MUCH appreciated and will help me craft future Grimm stories; I have several in the works, not all of them erotica. Imagining and writing about our beloved Grimm characters and their world is addictive! 
> 
> Also, many thanks to everyone else writing stories, keeping Grimm fresh & alive for us after the end of Season 6. May there someday be many more seasons, or a movie, or whatever will work to bring back our Grimm!
> 
> And no, I'm not a furry... ;) just really got into imagining how this might be for them! I hope no real furries reading this will be bothered by my take on Wesen love. And as for that special bit of canid anatomy...it's called the os penis. Google it if curious!


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